“I said why are you talking to that thing?” Ian asked in tones of extreme exasperation, his tone implying that he'd asked it several times before and Michael simply hadn't noticed.

The raven-furred hedgehog look up at his brother, his emerald eyes entirely without warmth or love for his kin. “You'll see; yours is similar to mine. Look at it closely, Ian,” Michael instructed.

“You're nutzo,” Ian muttered but did as Michael asked. He seemed shocked after a moment. “I see fire,” he said.

“That's right. Now be quiet, listen,” Michael coached.

Ian scowled. “For what?” he asked, then stopped dead, seemingly intrigued by something, but only Ian himself could hear the words burning and raging through his mind. “Wha- what the f*ck?” he gasped.

“Accept it, Ian. We've finally found everything we could have wished for; the power to climb to the top,” Michael insisted.

“...oh.” Ian's strongest weakness was his absolute trust in Michael; Michael always knew what was best, even if he didn't like it, even if it didn't feel right. So Ian brought the eye-shaped amulet up to be level with his own left eye and closed his right. He gasped as the scorching evil of the amulet pierced his very soul and morphed him from merely a reckless thief with a slightly manic personality into an utterly mindless brute whose only desire was to cause as much pain and destruction as he possibly could.

Michael smiled cooly with dark satisfaction when he watched Ian's face, posture and very self seem to shift. “Good. It's been too long,” Michael said with a low chuckle.

“Uh-huh. Can I start the fires now?” Ian asked impatiently, hopping from foot to foot.

“Not yet, no, but very soon. Come, then, brother; the world is our oyster now,” Michael said before tossing the priceless scepter upon the ground and stepping on it, effectively ruining it. Ian took his amulet and literally melted it in his hand, and he'd never been the least bit pyrokinetic before.

Both boys cackled as they left the alley and their previous lives behind forever. For the two young hedgehogs were no longer merely Michael and Ian, but hosts to two wretched demons, powerful forces of evil that had been sealed into those ancient artifacts thousands of years ago by one of Mobigypt's most powerful kings.

Said pharaoh had had to sacrifice his own life for the spell, a spell designed to keep Mobius safe from the most potent forces of chaos of all time, Mephiles and Iblis.